More dry days coming, weatherman warns

Most parts of the country will continue experiencing dry weather conditions as the effects of delayed April rains continue to be felt.

Although the Meteorological Department forecasts rains in some regions in the next three days, dry conditions will continue to be felt in coming days.

“Rainfall is expected over a few parts of the country during the first half of the forecast period. The second half is expected to be mainly sunny and dry,” the report by the Meteorological Department says.

In the next one week, Central highlands, including Nairobi area are likely to experience mainly sunny intervals in the morning.

Afternoon and night showers are expected over few places between Tuesday and Friday.

The rest of the afternoons are expected to be sunny and the nights partly cloudy.

Western region is expected to also experience sunny intervals and night rains which could be characterised by thunderstorms.

Northern and eastern regions will experience sunny days and light rain during morning hours.

Already, the weatherman has predicted that during the long-rain season northern, eastern and coastal regions will experience less rainfall.

“The outlook for April 2019 indicates that several parts of north-western, south-eastern and the coastal regions are likely to experience below average (depressed) rainfall that may be characterised by episodic heavy storms.

“The western, central and several parts of northeastern Kenya are likely to experience near-average rainfall. The distribution, both in time and space, is however likely to be poor,” the weatherman said in an overview report for the rainy season.

Temperatures have also been rising over the last one week in most parts where the highest temperature was recorded in Mandera capturing a maximum 39.8 degrees Celsius on April 2.

Marsabit, Kitale and Kabarak areas particularly experienced a rise in temperatures.

Nyahururu recorded the lowest daily minimum temperature of 6.5 degrees Celsius on April 6.

This year the rainy season has been delayed by almost three weeks in what the meteorological department attribute to effects of the tropical Cyclone Idai which has left hundreds dead in Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

Reports show that the tropical cyclone has played a key role in delaying the March-April-May rains leading to prolonged sunny and dry weather conditions.

“The seasonal rainfall onset was also expected to be timely over several parts of the country.

“However, a Tropical Cyclone known as “IDAI” located in the Mozambican Channel for several days has played a key role in delaying the northward movement of the rain-bearing Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ).

The cyclone significantly reduced moisture influx into the country and this led to the continued sunny and dry weather conditions over the better part of the country,” a report by the meteorological department on the long rains said.